No.
He pulled away from her, the sound of his racing heart and throbbing other parts pounding in his head. They were starting over, starting fresh. This isn’t what he wanted. Well, not yet.
He planted his hands on the wall behind her and was gratified to see her eyes were as unfocused as his had to be. “I don’t even know you.”
Chapter 11
Claire had to laugh at that. Not because it was particularly funny, but because she was…happy. Happy that he didn’t know her, happy that he still wanted to kiss her and stroke her hair and wasn’t running away. As soon as she’d said “Jasmine La Quinta,” she’d imagined a budget Paris Hilton. And when he’d said “hotel heiress,” she knew.
Tom got her.
He really got her.
“What do you need to know? I’m Jasmine La Quinta. I’m a scandalously rich jetsetter. The paparazzi capture my every move.”
She reached up to caress his hair, as a test, to see how far he was going. He seemed to soften, he got that melty look in his eyes, and then he shook his head.
“Look, just because I’m an international champion driver and possible MI6 spy doesn’t mean I’m a man whore.”
Claire pouted even though a thrill ran through her veins. He was staying. He was playing. “Shame. I’m stuck here in this nowhere town, I have to be in this wedding, and I’m terribly bored.”
Tom smiled sexily, an expression worthy of James Bond. “Night’s still young.”
“You’re a groomsman, right? How do you know the groom?” Claire ducked under Tom’s arm and went to refill the champagne glasses, as much to give her shaky hands something to do as to get more champagne in her.
“I met him in astronaut training.”
Claire burst out laughing at the thought of Tom and Tyler on Mars in Mark Watney mode.
“Spending three months in a space station makes you friends for life. What about you? How do you know the bride?”
Claire tried to answer, but the image of Tom and Tyler trying to grow poop potatoes was giving her the giggles. “Give me a second. Let me come up with something.” She racked her brain for something that Jasmine La Quinta would say. “Okay, I met Laurel in Switzerland.”
Tom rolled his eyes.
“At a spa,” Claire said, a wee bit defensively.
Tom fake coughed. “Weak.”
“After we pulled off a jewel heist from a bank in Zurich?”
He nodded approvingly. “Better.”
A glimmer of naughtiness caught on the edge of her imagination. “We had the most delicious massages.”
“Oh?” Tom’s response was noncommittal, but the glimmer of naughtiness in his eyes was not. He got her.
“Do you want me to show you?”
“It’s tempting.”
“But first you have to relax.”
He lifted his champagne flute. As if Jasmine La Quinta would settle for that.
Claire shook her head. “No. In there.” She pointed at the swirling hot tub on the deck, where the steam rose in thick plumes. Without another word, as if they needed no further communication, they both turned and went inside the changing rooms.
Since she had helped Lucia the housekeeper organize the rooms herself, she was already in the hot tub when Tom came out, waiting for him.
He’d found a pair of extra trunks that were kept in an antique reed basket, and she kept her head low over the roiling, steamy bubbles as he slid into the hot tub.
She pushed through the water into his waiting arms.
“Christ, Claire,” he hissed when he realized she was completely, undeniably, one hundred percent nude.
Voices intruded through her haze—a man’s and a woman’s—coming from the direction of the beach—or maybe the house; it was hard to tell in the swirl of heat and lust and the dull roar of the hot tub.
Tom pulled her tighter as he heard the voices, too. It was a protective gesture, and if the hundred-degree water hadn’t melted her cold heart, that did in an instant. They listened to the voices, and then a cold, hairy nose appeared in Tom’s ear, causing Tom to jerk and see the adorable doggie face of Lady Anne, Bits’ ancient Irish Setter.
Lady Anne popped her front paws on the side of the hot tub, looked quite pleased with herself for finding her favorite veterinarian, and ignored the woman’s voice calling her name.
“Lady, go!” Tom said as the dog licked the side of his face.
“Lady!” The woman’s voice came again, and this time it was close enough to identify.
Claire clutched at Tom’s arm. “It’s Janine!” Being interrupted in this romantic scenario was bad enough. Being interrupted by Janine was Claire’s worst nightmare. If Janine had been snotty about Claire being barefoot on the yacht, Claire couldn’t imagine the bitchy comments about nudity in the hot tub.
Apparently, Tom agreed. He stood, bringing Claire with him, stepped out of the whirlpool in a big slosh, and picked Claire up, heading the opposite way from the ladies’ changing room.
“My clothes!” she cried. “They’re back there!”
“I’m failing to see the problem,” he said as he hopped over a low wall surrounding the pool.
He ducked through shrubbery, up the back walk, weaving through the shadows, leaving wet, muddy footprints on the sun porch and the south staircase. Claire directed Tom to her room, at the end of the south guest wing.
When they were safe behind a locked door, Tom took Claire’s mouth in a heated, possessive kiss. Her skin burned as if they were still in the hot tub. Her head swam as if it was filled with bubbles, unable to focus on anything but his hands on her, his slick, hot skin pressing against hers.
She tugged on his borrowed swimsuit and they were on equal, naked terms. For the first time in years, there was nothing between them but what had been there all along: honest, raw attraction.
With a sure grip, Tom pulled her toward the bed, and as they fell together, Claire knew that while nothing had changed between them in the last decade, from this point forward, nothing would be the same.
In the silver light of the Maine dawn, Tom whispered her name. “Jasmine,” she corrected him. “My name is Jasmine.” The time for games had passed, but she wasn’t ready for their magical relationship reboot to end. Too soon, the sun would rise, and with it the same old issues that she didn’t want to face. For now, she was content to lie in Tom’s arms and forget her own name.
Chapter 12
Claire hadn’t organized the bridal luncheon, so she entered the parlor already feeling a bit uneasy. Bits had insisted on pampering her daughter the bride and her bridesmaids with this meal of champagne, tea sandwiches, and blueberry parfaits. Laurel was trying to talk to a tired-looking Ashton about Ashton’s new job, and Maggie was on her phone.
Since the only other seat was next to Janine, Claire took the spot next to Maggie, feeling a strange mix of emotions thinking about her own cell phone flying into the Atlantic, the man who had sent it flying, and the same man who had crawled out of her bed this morning.
“Are you going to put that away at the ceremony later?” Claire had meant it as a joke, but Maggie glared at her and said something about Barbies under her breath, so maybe Claire’s emotional turmoil was affecting her more than she thought.
Therefore she had to stop thinking about Tom. Yes, they’d had a fantastic night together. Yes, she was confused because she didn’t hate him anymore. Yes, she had no idea what business a Manhattan fashion publicist and a Bar Harbor veterinarian had being with the other. But none of these issues should take away from Laurel’s big day. Her best friend only got married once. Claire needed to focus on the bride, live in the moment, and forget about faux Formula One drivers with very big—
“Bless you!” Ashton said after Janine sneezed loudly.
“You’re not getting sick, are you?” Claire asked.
Janine gave Claire a withering look. “No. I was out last night with Lady Anne and she ran off through the bushes and I think I’m allergic to so
mething she rolled in.”
“Oh no!” Laurel made a sympathetic face. “I’ve got Benadryl if you need it.”
“Lady Anne is such a sweet girl,” Maggie said.
Janine rolled her eyes. “She was a nightmare. But you wouldn’t believe what I heard by the pool house.” Before anyone could ask, Janine went on, obviously enjoying the story. Claire said a silent prayer that what Janine had heard had not been…
“I heard someone having sex!” Janine said dramatically, as if she expected a loud gasp from her audience, but the reactions were a little quieter. Maggie and Ashton both looked a little nervous. Laurel adopted a look of faux interest that Claire knew very well—she tended to use it when she was about to deflect something.
“Huh.” Laurel turned to Ashton. “Did your shower stop dripping? I asked Maggie’s dad to come up and take a look at it and he said he tightened it up.”
“Speaking of showers,” Janine said with a raised voice. “I heard the couple in the hot tub! Can you believe what people would do in a hot tub?”
“Gross,” Maggie agreed, a little too quickly.
“Ugh.”
“Disgusting.” Ashton and Laurel nodded in agreement and Claire…well, she had to chime in. “I hope whoever desecrated the Ramsey hot tub is brought to justice.”
“Oh, they will,” Janine assured the table. “I found the clothes they left behind in the changing rooms.” Ashton, Maggie, and Laurel relaxed, but Claire froze. What if Janine figured it out? What if she spilled the beans on Tom and Claire here, at the luncheon? Would Laurel be able to forgive her?
“What kind of clothes were they?” Ashton asked.
“Like, old shirts and jeans.”
Ah. Claire saw her safety net. “Men’s or women’s?”
Janine frowned. “I don’t know.”
“So you don’t even know if the culprits were a man and a woman or two men?”
“I heard a woman’s voice,” Janine said.
Claire shrugged. “Or two women. Sounds like a mystery you’ll never get to the bottom of.” Then, to borrow a trick from her best friend, Claire turned to Laurel. “Are you all packed for the honeymoon?”
Laurel blushed. “Actually, I was going to tell you. There’s been a change in plans.” Laurel took a deep breath. “We’re not going on a honeymoon.”
Janine shouted, Maggie raised her eyebrows, and Ashton cried, “No Lesley Island?”
“What’s Lesley Island?” Maggie asked.
“It’s our family’s private island, off the coast of South Carolina,” Ashton said.
“A private island. Must be nice,” Maggie said as she picked up her glass of champagne. A model of underprivilege, there.
Ashton still seemed apologetic. “It’s small, and remote, and about twenty people co-own it, so it’s not like Richard Branson’s island. But Aunt Felicity wanted to give Laurel and Tyler their honeymoon at the family house.”
“And it was so nice of her,” Laurel said, reaching for Ashton’s hand to give it a reassuring squeeze. “But Tyler and I have spent this whole week here at the Cove and we decided last night that we’re ready to head home to our little loft and start our life.” She looked back at Ashton. “We’re going to visit the island later this year. Ty says it’s heaven in the fall.”
“When there’s not a hurricane,” Janine added, which irritated Claire. Why did some people have to be so negative and ruin everyone’s fun? Like Maggie over there, taking out her phone and scowling. Again.
“Is it a really important email?” Claire asked pointedly. “Or something that can be dealt with later?”
Maggie lifted her long lashes in a slow, menacing sweep. “I know you must be sick about your phone, Claire. But I guess Tom did you a favor removing that distraction for you. He’s always gone the extra mile. One time, when we were in high school, he—”
“Weird,” Claire said. “He never mentioned his high school friends much when he was in college.” It might have been rude, but she was only reflecting Maggie’s unexplained animosity toward her.
“Strange, since he dated Laurel for so long.” Maggie smiled at Claire but her eyes were narrowed. “I guess he just never shared his Bar Harbor life with you.”
That was it. Claire felt a rush of possessiveness through her blood. Tom didn’t belong to this Maggie person, who now lived in Texas, for Pete’s sake. He had spent last night in Claire’s bed, and she didn’t have to take this passive-aggressive bitchiness from anyone in this room.
Claire checked her watch. “I can’t believe you’re getting married in a few hours, Laurel! And there’s still so much for me to do!”
“Oh no!” Laurel was dismayed. “What can I do? I feel awful. I’m just sitting around getting my hair done for the rest of the afternoon.”
“Not a thing,” Claire assured her. “I would never ask a bride to work on her own wedding day.” She smiled at her friend. “But if Maggie could help me out, I would so appreciate it. Since she’s a local, she probably knows exactly where to get what I need.”
Laurel smiled brightly. “Perfect!”
“Thanks, Maggie!” Claire grabbed a pen and started scribbling a list on her notepad. “Don’t forget, I need the light green floral wire. The dark green is tacky.”
In the end, Claire spared Maggie and only gave her three errands to run. It wasn’t because she was nice; it was because Claire needed a few errands herself today in order to keep her mind off Tom and the consequences of whatever it was they were doing with each other now.
Chapter 13
After he’d slipped away from Claire’s room before the sun rose, Tom had to check on thirty-something rescue puppies, making him late to the round of golf the rest of the groomsmen were enjoying. It wasn’t a huge disappointment. Tom hadn’t been raised in the country club environment that Tyler and Cinco Ramsey had, nor was he some Silicon Valley tycoon the way that Maggie’s date was, so he had never developed a fondness for the links. When he joined the group, they were breaking for drinks at the ninth hole, ribbing each other and joking about the wedding that night.
Tyler took the comments good-naturedly, the very picture of a satisfied groom. “I don’t care what any of you jerk-offs say. I’m marrying the best woman on the planet.” Tom couldn’t do anything else but raise his glass, a gesture that Cinco noticed.
“Dude,” Cinco said to Tom. “You dated Laurel.” Cinco turned to Tyler. “Doesn’t it freak you out that her ex is at your wedding?”
With any other man, this would have been awkward. But Tyler James was a good guy. “No way,” he said with an easy smile as he tilted his beer toward Tom. “She had to kiss some frogs before she got to her prince.”
Tom returned the toast, grateful that Tyler had always accepted Tom as Laurel’s friend. “Laurel is a great woman.” Tom lifted his glass in a toast to the bride. “To the great women in our lives. May we deserve them someday.”
All the men lifted their drinks, and Tom couldn’t help but notice that Cruz was missing the testosterone fest and Hawk looked a little distracted. If it had been up to Tom, he would have started talking about baseball, but Cinco had to go ahead and put his foot in it. “Marriage, though. Man, women are just trying to cut off our balls, aren’t they?”
His friendship with Laurel aside, Tom had never understood her brother. Cinco had always been the dimmest bulb in the bright Ramsey chandelier. Since Tyler seemed to be trying to take Cinco under his newly minted brother-in-law wing, he actually acted like Cinco had said something worthy of a response.
“No way. It’s not like that. Not with me and Laurel, anyway. From the very first time I met her, I knew. She was it, you know? She was it for me.” Tyler turned to George. “You remember. I called you that night. You remember what I said about her?”
George shifted uncomfortably from foot to foot. Tom felt his pain. “You, uh, said you met this girl named Laurel.”
Unaccountably, that less than descriptive response made Tyler’s grin double in size. �
��Exactly. And it was like—” He snapped his fingers. “Easy. Boom. We both knew. We’ve been together ever since.”
Now it was Tom’s turn to feel discomfited as images of the first time he met Claire swarmed into his brain. Easy? Sorta. Boom? Absolutely. That flash of certainty that they were going to be together forever? Not so much.
Freshman Orientation Mixer
“Hi.”
The blond girl looked down at her soda, then glanced over her shoulder to see who he was waving at. There was only a fire extinguisher on the wall behind her, but she still looked confused.
“I was talking to you.”
“Me?” Her eyes opened wide like she was surprised, but why would she be? She was the cutest thing he’d seen in New York so far.
“Well, you are in my corner.”
“Your corner?” It sounded just as idiotic when she repeated it.
“Yeah. My corner. I mean, it’s not official or anything. I haven’t paid money for naming rights or signed a lease, but all through high school, I always claimed the corner. You know, at dances, parties, any awkward social event.”
Her pink lips twisted in amusement. Tom knew he had a weird sense of humor. If this girl thought his stupid line was funny, maybe he had a shot.
“What’s a mixer, anyway? How does one mix?” he asked in his best Seinfeld impersonation.
She nodded like maybe she was humoring him—or maybe she was playing along. “I think it’s just a way to try to encourage people to get to know each other.”
He quirked an eyebrow. “Like this? Are we doing it right? Are we mixing?”
“You’re strangely outgoing for a guy who spent his four years of high school skulking in corners,” she said.
“Skulking. Good SAT word. Did you pick that up in a review course?”
The Last Plus One Page 32
